Darian Ehler says that when he drives through Belleville, his muscles tense and he can't help looking in the rearview mirror for the face of the police officer he claims has been harassing him for years.

Ehler says officer Anthony Weedo has twice falsely arrested him for drunken driving, has mocked and thrown things at him in public, shines police lights in his home at night and once threw him in a jail cell with a bleeding carjacker who sexually molested him.

These might be dismissed as routine gripes against the police, except a Municipal Court judge already has found that Weedo repeatedly lied in one of the reports he filed after arresting Ehler, and the Essex County Prosecutor's Office has discovered the officer falsified a report in an unrelated case.

Superior Court Judge Donald Merkelbach will hear arguments tomorrow on a lawsuit in which Ehler claims that the Belleville Police Department has turned a blind eye to the wrongdoing of Weedo and other officers.

"I've lived in Belleville my entire life," Ehler said. "Now I am afraid to even be on the street. I feel like I have to move."

The suit alleges the department never disciplined Weedo and officer Joseph DeRose after Municipal Court Judge Frank Zinna found they had lied, and failed to act when the department's own psychiatrist determined that Weedo suffered from narcissistic personality traits and needed therapy.

"Belleville is a lawless town as far as these officers are concerned," said Timothy Alexander, Ehler's lawyer. "The department is perfectly willing to cover up the misconduct of its officers."

Police Chief Joseph Rotonda and Jeffrey Shanaberger, the attorney representing the township, declined to comment on the case while it is still in litigation.

But in a motion that asks Merkelbach to dismiss the case, Shanaberger argues that the township and the police department -- the only defendants in the case -- cannot be held responsible for intentional misconduct on the part of officers.

Alexander said that Ehler, 31, is an easy target for the police. His parents died in a murder-suicide in Belleville when he was 10, and he spent his high school years in special education.

He is currently part owner of a Nutley tavern, Jim Dandy's Mud Hole.

Alexander said Weedo, 41, made his first false arrest of Ehler in 2000, when he found him in a car with a girl in a Belleville park and forced him to put on the girl's pants. Ehler passed a Breathalyzer, but Weedo brought him in on suspicion of being under the influence of marijuana and took him to Clara Maas Medical Center for a blood test.

The test showed no presence of marijuana and the charges were later dismissed, Alexander said.

In April 2002, Ehler began dating Toni Anne Canning, who was recently separated from Belleville police officer Phil Canning. Alexander said Phil Canning threatened Ehler on a Belleville street a month later. Two years later, Ehler filed a complaint against the officer in Nutley Municipal Court, claiming he also had harassed him in that town. A judge dismissed the complaint and told the two to stay away from each other.

On May 30, 2002, Canning served Ehler with papers relating to the officer's pending divorce. Several hours later, at about 3 a.m. the next day, Ehler was driving on Franklin Avenue when he saw a police car coming in the opposite direction with its headlights off.

Ehler said he flashed his high beams as a friendly signal that the car's lights were out, after which the two officers in the car -- Weedo and DeRose -- did a U-turn and began following him.

A video camera mounted on the police car, which was activated after the officers made their U-turn, shows they followed him as he took a right turn at a red light at Sanford Avenue -- failing to come to a complete stop before turning -- and then made another right turn on Rocco Avenue, where they pulled him over next to his house.

The police report Weedo filed after the arrest stated Ehler repeatedly changed lanes as the officers followed and failed to pull over when they activated their lights on Franklin Avenue. It also said he slurred his words, was unable to walk and refused to take a Breathalyzer.

But when the case came to trial in Municipal Court in August 2002, Judge Frank Zinna reviewed the videotape and found it grossly contradicted Weedo's report. The tape, which was reviewed by The Star-Ledger, does not show Ehler changing lanes or driving erratically and it clearly shows that the police did not activate their lights and pull him over until they reached Rocco Avenue.

It also shows Ehler, who says he had drank nothing that night and was never asked to take a Breathalyzer, walking without any difficulty outside his car.

"It is impossible for this Court to accept the police officers' version over what my own eyes have observed on the video," Zinna said in his ruling. "At the scene, the defendant's ability to walk as I observed defendant in the video was anything but what was testified to by the officers and put in their police report."

Zinna reconstructed his ruling from his notes, because the transcript of the trial went missing.

On Oct. 4, 2002, the Essex County Prosecutor's Office sent Rotonda a letter saying it had discovered numerous false statements Weedo had put in a police report after his arrest of a robbery suspect in September 2001. Weedo claimed that he chased down and tackled the suspect, even though witnesses clearly stated that a citizen apprehended him.

After receiving the letter, Rotonda suspended Weedo for five days and referred him to a psychiatrist, Dr. Karen Omilian, who "strongly recommended" that he get 10 to 12 psychotherapy sessions. Omilian said Weedo, who she found to be "socially isolated," continued to claim he tackled the suspect and appeared to believe it, according to a copy of the report obtained by Ehler's attorney.

"Mr. Weedo wants to impress those in authority at the Police Department and has a grandiose view of himself," Omilian said, adding that his "personality style suggests narcissistic traits."

Meanwhile, Ehler filed an internal affairs complaint against Weedo and Canning, noting that Weedo had kept him in jail for 15 hours after the drunken driving arrest. He said Weedo mocked him about his dead parents and put a bleeding carjacker in his cell, even though all the other cells were empty.

Ehler said the carjacker grabbed his crotch three times, although no charges resulted.

Despite Zinna's finding and the complaint from the prosecutor's office, Capt. Nicholas Krentz found on June 27, 2002, that Ehler's internal affairs complaint was without merit. Krentz said his failure to stop before making the right turn on a red light and a cigarette he threw out the window were probable cause for him to be pulled over.

At the end of his report, Krentz made a brief reference to the discrepancies between Weedo's report and the events on the videotape, saying they suggest the officers need training in the handling of drunken driving suspects.